Google Play Protect is a feature that has launched back in 2017, and its primary goal is to protect Android users from unwanted and malicious apps found in the Google Play Store and via third parties.
Google has been making some changes to the feature in order to better protect Andoird users, according to Bleeping Computer.
Functions of Google Play Protect
The online magazine reports that whenever Google Play Protect is activated, it will perform the following tasks:
- It runs a safety check on apps from the Google Play Store before you download them.
- It checks your device for potentially harmful apps from other sources. These malicious apps are sometimes called malware.
- It warns you about any detected potentially harmful apps found, and removes known malicious apps from your device.
- It warns you about detected apps that violate our Unwanted Software Policy by hiding or misrepresenting important information.
Via a blog entry, Google just said that the feature is basically a scanning engine that runs in the background and looks for various apps coming from bad actors which have been uploaded in the Google Play Store.
This protects more than a billion devices daily.
“Google Play Protect is the technology we use to ensure that any device shipping with the Google Play Store is secured against potentially harmful applications (PHA),” stated Google’s blog post.
Google continues and explains:
“It is made up of a giant backend scanning engine to aid our analysts in sourcing and vetting applications made available on the Play Store, and built-in protection that scans apps on users’ devices, immobilizing PHA and warning users.”
Improvements made to Google Play Protect
The new features include the fact that Google Play Protect will be enabled by default for all Google Play users.
There’s also a new feature that allows displaying a warning when you open a new Android app. There will be a warning also when a user tries to launch a potentially malicious app.
We recommend that you read Google’s complete notes on the subject.
After finishing Theatrical Journalism at the Faculty of Theatre and Television in Cluj-Napoca, Rada reviewed movies, books, theatre pieces and she also wrote articles from the IT niche as a content editor for software producers. At the moment, she is working with various online advertising firms.